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The Metanarrative of Videogames Part 1 & 2
Original Post: November 15, 2010 Part 1 Videogames teach their players things: at the least how the internal system of the videogame works. This is a central principle on which Raph Koster’s theory of fun and Ian Bogost’s procedural rhetoric are both built on. Murray’s conceptions of agency and immersion rely on this fact in…
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Unpacking Mechanics and Meaning in FarCry 2
Original Post: November 1 2010 The following is an unpolished ‘critique’ of FarCry 2 in which I attempt to extract meaning from the combination of very strong, though sometimes hard to believe mechanics, with what narrative/aesthetic information is available. This will assume a lot of knowledge about FC2, and doesn’t provide any kind of introduction…
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The Great Undiscovered of Minecraft
Original Post: October 26, 2010 I have to admit, I am not much of an indie gamer. I spend most of my time with the big-budget mainstream titles in my research. There is a reason for that, but it isn’t the point of this article. What is important is that Minecraft managed to get my…
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Attempting to Appreciate Gears of War
Original Post: August 24, 2010 Where to begin with Gears of War? Yes, its a big-budget, AAA console action type game, which are meant to be just the kind of thing I’m mostly focused on, but I have only just played through it. Having played it now, I feel only slightly more inspired to write…
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Something About Starcraft
Original Post: August 2, 2010 To jump on a hyped-up bandwagon: StarCraft. That long-awaited sequel to a game I did actually play, rather religiously, back when it was current. I can’t say that I was among those eagerly awaiting its return, but it is a bit like an old friend you haven’t seen in a…
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Red Dead Reflections
Original Post: June 11, 2010 Yes, I’ve been waiting weeks to use that title. I actually had a very brief review of this game published at Kotaku so check it out there. What we have here will be a longer version with more elaborations than the 500 words allowed me there. Read Dead Redemption is…
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Drama ex Machina: The Desperation Meter
Original Post: April 11, 2010 This post is a speculative solution to a problem I noticed in Assassin’s Creed, both I and II, but could equally be used in other vaguely similar games. Firstly, let me outline the problem as I see it, and then describe my mechanical solution. I loved both Assassin’s Creed games,…
